LE3 .A278 2022

2022

Vibert, Conor

Acadia University

Bachelor of Business Administration

Honours

Business Administration

Business

Academics and researchers have long wondered about how decisions makers in organizations perceive the environments in which they operate in. This important question assumes that the behaviours of organizations are not solely determined by their environments. A group of observers from BCG suggests that the different ways managers perceive these operating environments can be grouped into five different categories making up a framework called the Strategy Palette. The framework was based on observations of large corporations in the Fortune 500. It begged the question, does this framework also apply to managers of Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) which make up over half of national GDP? The framework was presented as being all encompassing and applicable to managers of SMEs. A set of hypotheses were tested in the current study using textual analysis of a dataset of SME manager interviews to determine whether managers were perceiving their operating environment through a specific strategy described in the Strategy Palette. It was found that the Strategy Palette is applicable to the context of SMEs. The scope of this study was limited but allows for further research into the different applications and nuances of the Strategy Palette.

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https://scholar.acadiau.ca/islandora/object/theses:3808